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Guess what: Australians have spent the last three years getting a little bit dumber. Well, at least according to the Australian Academy of Science, we’ve lost touch with a few key basic facts.

Repeating a national survey of science literacy first conducted in 2010, a survey published today by the Academy found just two thirds of us know that it takes a year for the Earth to travel around the sun, compared with three quarters in 2010. Among 18 to 24-year-olds, the rate knowing the correct answer fell from 74% to 62%; among those over 65, the rate fell from 51% to 46%.

Nomadic Lass

Luckily, slightly more of us (73% now compared with 70% in 2010) know that early humans (are we allowed to call them cavemen and women any more?) didn’t live with dinosaurs.

The Academy found a number of other details about our scientific literacy:

39% of us know 70% of Earth’s surface is water

70% of us know evolution is occurring

73% of us know we’re influencing the evolution of other species

Happily, 79% of us say science education is very important or absolutely essential to the economy.

The survey says … very little, actually

Surveys of this type are, to put it bluntly, blatant [concern trolling](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll_(Internet%29%23Concern_troll). Scientists and the science interested can collectively gnash their teeth at the large groups of people who fail to grasp some rudimentary scientific fact.

They get great coverage, and they get politicians promising to do more to enhance the scientific literacy of the public.

But they really don’t mean very much. So 73% of Australians know the earliest humans didn’t live at the same time as dinosaurs - but how is that relevant to policy or politics?

rofi

We pretend that factoids are a useful proxy for scientific literacy, and in turn that scientific literacy is a useful proxy for good citizenship. But there’s simply no evidence this is true.

Science is increasingly a social issue. Lines between science, technology and their applications are increasingly blurred. There are ethical, political and environmental considerations.

Science and technology relate to areas such as health, education, leisure and employment. The issues are interrelated, complex and subject to rapid change. Will understanding Earth rotates around the sun help deal with any of these issues? Likely not.

Scientific literacy may be one aspect that defines a good citizen, but to claim scientific literacy equals good citizenship is naïve.

Yet we still persist in using these surveys to berate the public for not knowing more.

Science literacy surveys such as these do nothing except keep academics busy, tick various grant recipient boxes and make the general public feel more disillusioned about their scientific abilities.

Would a Nobel laureate in physics be able to answer biology questions? Possibly. But we don’t ask them to. We recognise it’s not their field of expertise. So why are we asking the general public questions about science unrelated to most peoples’ expertise or day-to-day lives?

Kevin Dooley

The questions these tests ask have absolutely no bearing on the kinds of scientific literacy needed today. The kind of understanding needed about alternative energy sources, food security or water management; things that actually relate to global challenges.

Australia’s research and scientific community recognises this, as evidenced through the formation of a research alliance.

This alliance calls for a non-partisan, national strategy to invest in research and translation of science. Nowhere in the statement is there a call to educate the public about the living arrangements of dinosaurs and our cave dwelling ancestors.

Rather, there is the argument to support and nurture the existing science and research sectors, and to provide the necessary resources to ensure Australia actually has a research future.

Australia needs science, research and innovation to ensure our economy and society remains strong and internationally competitive in the 21st century.

The point people should be grasping from these survey results is that 79% of respondents see the crucial relationship between science and the economy.

Will 79% of our politicians also make the same connection, and act on it appropriately? That’s the real test.